Oasis In A War Zone -- Dubai, Where Arab Traditions Co-Exist With Western Ways, Is A Place To Test Stereotypes About Travel In The Middle East

CUTLINE: ALAN BERNER / SEATTLE TIMES: THE GREENS AND FAIRWAYS OF THE EMIRATES GOLD CLUB, CARVED OUT OF DESERT SAND, REQUIRE 100,000 GALLONS OF WATER A DAY.

CUTLINE: TOURISTS FROM TOKYO PICNIC IN THE 100-PLUS-DEGREE WEATHER IN THE DESERT OUTSIDE FUJAIRAH, ONE OF THE SHEIKDOMS THAT MAKE UP THE UNITED ARAB EMIRATES.

CUTLINE: WITH U.S. MARINES IN ATTENDANCE TO RAISE THE FLAG, AMERICANS CELEBRATE THE FOURTH OF JULY ON JULY 1 IN DUBAI. IT'S A RARE SIGHT TO SEE THE STARS AND STRIPES FLOWN IN THE ARAB WORLD.

CUTLINE: KNIGHT-RIDDER / SEATTLE TIMES: MAP OF THE MIDDLE EAST SHOWING DUBAI

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - Iraq's invasion of Kuwait and decades of war and tension have made the Middle East - except Israel and Egypt - terra incognita to most American tourists.

But this small sheikdom could be called the Middle East for travelers who don't like the Middle East.

The antipathy of some Arabs to the United States because of unwanted Western cultural influences, our support of Israel and our interference in the oil-rich region can make it seem potentially hostile, mysterious and difficult to the American tourist.

Let's face it, Iran's references to the U.S. as ``the great Satan'' is hardly the stuff of vacation brochures.

That's what makes Dubai so intriguing. Perhaps no Arab country is more modern, inviting and accessible.

Those who want a camel race or dune safari in the morning, an

unspoiled beach in the afternoon and a five-star hotel at night will find Dubai something truly different: a desert Disneyland of old and new, poor and rich, Moslem rigidity and cosmopolitan swankiness.

Little more than a creekside village on the Persian Gulf 30 years ago, the emirate began exporting oil in 1964. Today, Dubai is a cosmopolitan trading and tourism center offering Western comforts and a touch of desert exotica.

Though Dubai is supporting the U.S. military buildup in the Persian Gulf, tension in the area makes it unlikely American tourists will, or should, visit any time soon. (The State Department advises Americans to defer all travel to the Gulf states.)

But if the crisis is defused, a visit there could be both instructive and fun - a place to test your stereotypes and learn that not all Arabs, and Arab countries, are alike.

Dubai does not have the reactionary conservatism against Western ways found in nations such as Saudi Arabia. While it is no Las Vegas, alcohol is served in the hotels, skimpy Western swimsuits raise no eyebrows on the beaches, and Western movies play in the theaters.

Make no mistake, this is a foreign country. The Arab executives have retained their eminently practical flowing robes, called dishdashas, and head-dress called a ghuttra. Their black-gowned wives with tattooed fingers remain veiled as they shop the gold souk, or bazaar, of glittering jewelry.

Camels crop the desert scrub next to modern industrial plants, and dhows, traditional wooden coastal ships, line the brackish inlet called a creek.

The blend of east and west, old and new, can be as surprising and jarring to a visiting American as it must be to the native Arabs. It is a country with both the minarets of mosques and the satellite dishes of modern communication.

By itself, Dubai does not have the history, scenery or culture to lure tourists from as far away as Seattle. And those who want to experience the ``real'' Middle East can arguably pass this country-club nation by.

But American travelers already in the Middle East, southern Asia or East Africa will find Dubai a clean, efficient, welcoming oasis away from the poverty and sometimes intolerant politics of the Indian Ocean basin.

The desert around Dubai is flat, scrubby and hot, some of it blinding salt flats. Its starkness is broken only by palms lining the highways and the garden oases of hotels and resorts. But it has an exotic beauty, its color changing in the light from a pitiless white to rose-colored sand dunes.

Its treeless Hajar Mountains are raw and elemental; the east coast on the Gulf of Oman is lovely, with long crescents of sand beach between headlands.

Dubai, one of seven emirates in the United Arab Emirates, is similar to invaded Kuwait in having a small land base, a rich population and a lot of oil. Dubai has only 1,505 square miles, compared to King County's 2,131 square miles. The entire UAE is only half the size of Washington state.

Times photographer Alan Berner and I were in Dubai a month before the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait ignited the latest regional crisis.

The bomb dogs that sniffed the Hilton Hotel compound where foreign expatriates celebrated the Fourth of July (on July 1) were a reminder of the tensions in this part of the world.

So was the decision not to have fireworks, and the presence of machine-gun-toting guards in the shrubbery shadows beyond the Safeway booth distributing Lucerne ice cream.

But the fact Americans were allowed to have a July 4 bash, complete with a flag-raising by U.S. Marines from nearby Abu Dhabi, should tip you that Dubai is no Iraq.

The eight-year Iran-Iraq war never touched here except as a boost to the smuggling and ship-repair business. Americans who lived here at the time told us they never felt threatened by the tanker war over the horizon.

``I felt more comfortable when I lived there (during the war) than I do in the U.S. now,'' said Charles Heath, director of Dubai's North American Tourism Promotion Board, based in Philadelphia. Statistically, Dubai is one of the world's safest countries in terms of crime. Penalties are severe.

Heath said that while some European tour groups have canceled trips to Dubai for the tourism season that starts about now, others have stepped forward to take their place. The tourist business expects only a slight dip this winter.

Two new hotels - a Holiday Inn Crown Plaza and a Marriott - are under construction, and a Chicago conference to promote Dubai tourism is still planned.

We visited the seaside village of Dibba one morning during Eid-ul-adha, a Moslem holiday. Young girls in holiday finery flitted along the street.

The intricate floral patterns dyed on their hands and fingers were an indication of their Arab culture; a few clopped awkwardly in high heels, a sign of Western influence.

As Alan stopped to take pictures, children swarmed around us, bringing their curious parents from the walled courtyards of their houses. Despite our intrusion into a holiday similar to Easter or Thanksgiving, they were friendly and curious.

One gentleman, in halting English, invited us to share the day's feast with his family. Our schedule prevented us from accepting, but now that crisis has flared again I regret we did not. I wish I had shared more of the Arab culture, as they have adapted, sometimes enthusiastically and sometimes painfully, to ours.

It also would have been a rare opportunity to meet Dubai's Arabs. The tourist-industry employees whom visitors usually meet in Dubai are almost entirely foreign workers. The native population, while adopting what it judges to be the best of the West, tends to be more aloof.

Only about 25 percent of Dubai's population of about 500,000 is Arab Bedouins and coastal traders who inherited a wealth of oil. That oil has made Dubai one of the richest city-states, per capita, in the world. The police, for example, drive Mercedes patrol cars.

The remaining population is a conglomerate of European, Japanese and American technicians and south Asian laborers. Most of Dubai's service jobs are filled by Indians, Pakistanis, Sri Lankans, Chinese and Filipinos, who sign on for a few years to work for wages more than double their national norm. Dubai's Mexican restaurant, for example, had Filipino waiters and waitresses and a visiting American pop band.

American oil and technical workers are lured to Dubai by high wages, no U.S. income tax, and sometimes subsidized housing.

Dubai and six other emirates banded together in 1971, under British tutelage, to form the UAE. (The others are Abu Dhabi, Ajman, Fujairah, Ras al Khaimah, Sharjah and Umm al Qaiwain).

Abu Dhabi is the richest in oil, and Dubai is the most bustling tourist and trade center, with the busiest airport and tallest skyscraper (at 39 stories) in the Middle East.

The two cities are about two hours apart by car. The other five emirates are smaller and less developed.

Like invaded Kuwait, Dubai is not a democracy. Sheik Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum ``owns'' Dubai's oil and dispenses its benefits to his people as he sees fit. He has shrewdly diversified the economy with trade, aluminum manufacturing, ship repair and tourism. The mansions and stables of the Arab elite dot the country.

Dubai is not immune to world politics. It does not welcome Israelis and will not accept American tourists whose passports show they have visited Israel. To get around this common Mideast travel problem, visitors to Israel can have their Israeli visit stamped on a separate piece of paper or, in some cases, get a second passport.

Most of the 10,000 to 15,000 American tourists who now come to Dubai each year are business travelers. In contrast, European couples and families are discovering the oil states, with their empty beaches and bathtub-temperature seas, for winter resort vacations.

Heath is hoping to market Dubai as a destination for richer Americans looking for something different, and to travelers seeking a stopover after Egypt, Israel or Kenya.

Any Indiana Jones image of the Middle East is out of date here. A mud-walled fort, for example, looking like something out of a French Foreign Legion movie, serves as a museum in Dubai, displaying Arab clothing, weapons, utensils and living quarters from the past.

The new Dubai has a golf course carved out of the desert that consumes 100,000 gallons of desalinated water a day. Freeways are so filled with cars that the sheik has cracked down on granting licenses to foreigners. Shopping ranges from Porsche-designed leather goods to $2 music tapes; food runs from Baskin & Robbins ice cream to French and Japanese.

The water is safe to drink; the food, mostly imported, is excellent, and the plumbing and air conditioning work.

The embrace of change here is stunning. In a generation, Dubai has made health care, modern housing and education universally available. With so few people and so much oil, it has made possible a lifestyle that the masses in less fortunate countries such as Iran, Iraq, Syria or Egypt can scarcely comprehend.

Dubai is not yet Hong Kong, but it makes no secret that it would like to match that city and Singapore as a trade and tourism center.

Prices are roughly similar to what you would pay in the U.S., but the facilities catering to Westerners are generally in the luxury class.

Dubai is a convenient halfway point between Europe and India. Tailoring its plane schedules to mesh with the time zones of bigger places, its airport is packed at night.

Still, you have doubts. Go to the Middle East for sun? you ask. Isn't that like going to Siberia for snow?

Frankly, I can't recommend Dubai in July.

When we visited, the place was a sticky furnace, with daytime highs over 100 degrees and nighttime lows of 85. The humidity was 80 percent, and can reach 95 percent. The sea was unpleasantly warm, about 95 degrees.

But winter - we were assured by the Americans who live here - is another story. From November through April, they boasted, Dubai has one of the best climates in the world, with air and sea in the 80s and low humidity. Many compared it to Southern California before smog.

There are several car-rental agencies and the highways are excellent. One note of caution is not to hit one of the wandering camels that sometimes cross the highway: Not only may you wind up in worse shape that the beast, but if you do injure or kill one, a Briton quipped, ``Its owner will turn up in court to testify it's a prime racing camel that was pregnant.''

If you find yourself in Dubai at a time of fewer tensions, the emirate offers a number of activities: -- THE DESERT: Dune driving and ``wadi bashing'' - a term imported from Australia to describe driving up a dry wash, or wadi - are popular diversions. Keeping in mind the environmental havoc off-road vehicles have visited on American deserts, I'd advise negotiating wadis without bashing them, however.

The desert can be dangerous for the unprepared, so the usual way to see the wilderness is with a tour company that supplies guides, food and four-wheel-drive vehicles. Choices include a day safari with lunch; an evening safari to see the sunset, followed by an Arab barbecue under the stars; or an overnight safari. Some trips include a visit to a Bedouin camp.

-- THE SEA: Several major hotels are either on the sea or have a private beach and a shuttle to it. Activities include swimming, scuba diving, board and sailboat sailing, fishing, jet skis and water skiing.

-- THE TOWN: Dubai and its sister town of Deira are, practically speaking, one big city divided by a wide, short inlet. While there are modern bridges and an auto tunnel, the cheapest and most scenic way to get across the water is on an abra, or wooden water taxi.

Along the narrow streets are the gold souk, or bazaar, where price is determined by the weight of a piece of jewelry; the spice souk, the dress-material souk and more modern souks of electronics and audio and video tapes, sometimes at bargain prices.

In winter, tourists can watch camel races. Other entertainment ranges from folklore to belly dancing to Western pop groups. There is also golf, movies, a modern mall, luxury stores, horseback riding in the desert, go-karts, bicycling from the mountain resort of Hatta and - you guessed it - ice skating, either at Al Nasr Leisureland or the Hyatt Regency Galleria.

-- EXCURSIONS: Hatta, near Dubai, has a mountain fort, a resort hotel and tours through a wadi noted for its greenery and wildlife.

The oasis of Al Ain, in the Abu Dhabi emirate next door, has archaeological sites, a zoo, an amusement park and a camel market.

Abu Dhabi itself is a city carved out of inhospitable surroundings, and the road connecting it with Dubai passes by Jebel Ali, the largest artificial harbor in the world. The industrial park there has drawn factories from around the world with its promise of zero taxes and free trade.

But perhaps the most interesting thing about Dubai is its seeming improbability: an oasis of change in a hostile desert.

IF YOU GO

Getting there: Dubai is served by many major airlines and also by Emirates Air. Tourists will probably not be able to fly directly from Israel, however.

The required visa can be obtained in advance through the United Arab Emirates Embassy in Washington, D.C., or picked up at the Dubai airport if arranged through a hotel where you have reservations. Because of the number of foreigners wishing to work in Dubai, immigration does not routinely grant visas to ``unsponsored'' visitors.

Dubai has a number of modern chain hotels, with pools and air conditioning. Three other resort hotels of note are the Chicago Beach and Jebel Ali, both on the Persian Gulf with private beaches, and Hatta Fort, in the mountains.

Cuisine is international: American, European, Asian and Mexican restaurants are all available.

Major credit cards are usually accepted. Prices are similar to U.S. levels, though shopping can sometimes yield bargains.

The official language is Arabic but English is widely spoken, particularly by tourist-oriented businesses. Road signs are in both languages.

Dress should be modest off the beaches. Arab women should not be approached without introduction. Penalties for drug possession or other crimes are extremely harsh. And don't hit any camels!